
As we leave 2005 I wish the best to all of you for 2006. Look for a wrap up of 2005 sometime this week. Enjoy!
For what its worth, I am a 'time limited' casual, PvP oriented, usually solo, player. I also have a blog, a dog, and a family. Don't forget the _ , because without it you just have heartless.
"*Alliance players will enjoy playing as Draenei, and the new Blood Elf race gives the Horde faction its first exercise in what humans perceive as sex appeal (even though those Troll females are pretty cute)."Update: 29 Nov, 2009 - Removed broken links and pictures. Applied label.
"I think most of the people hating on MTV here have not honestly seen any of their gaming shows. It is heads and tales above anything G4 produces. Most obviously because there is more money being spent on production, but a few key areas they hit make gamers watch... and we're not just talking teenagers.Update: 6 Nov, 2006 - Updated post and applied labels. Removed link to now defunct Gamergod.com article.
1. If they don't have the content they don't have a show for it. G4 thinks just because its part of gaming they need to have a show on it. I think that speaks for itself.
2. They produce quality over quantity. G4 is exactly the opposite because they are still trying to fill in all that time between Man Show reruns and infomercials.
3. They focus on gamers of ALL variety. MTV is well known for selling sex to teenagers, but oddly enough when it comes to gaming they sell it without believing their audience is a bunch of teenage boys. Find one thing on G4 that isn't trying to sell their programming to a bunch of teenage boys.
The great thing about MTV is you can grab a TV guide and watch what you want. You can TIVO quality shows without having to worry if your TIVOing another rerun off of G4.
To each his own."
"I think most of the people hating on MTV here have not honestly seen any of their gaming shows. It is heads and tales above anything G4 produces. Most obviously because there is more money being spent on production, but a few key areas they hit make gamers watch... and we're not just talking teenagers.Update: 6 Nov, 2006 - Updated post and applied labels. Removed link to now defunct Gamergod.com article.
1. If they don't have the content they don't have a show for it. G4 thinks just because its part of gaming they need to have a show on it. I think that speaks for itself.
2. They produce quality over quantity. G4 is exactly the opposite because they are still trying to fill in all that time between Man Show reruns and infomercials.
3. They focus on gamers of ALL variety. MTV is well known for selling sex to teenagers, but oddly enough when it comes to gaming they sell it without believing their audience is a bunch of teenage boys. Find one thing on G4 that isn't trying to sell their programming to a bunch of teenage boys.
The great thing about MTV is you can grab a TV guide and watch what you want. You can TIVO quality shows without having to worry if your TIVOing another rerun off of G4.
To each his own."
Unfortunately, no copy of this article exists.
Update: 7 Nov, 2006 - Reposted from old Heartless Gamer Reviews section and applied labels.
Update: 2 Apr, 2007 - Edited labels and article.
Update: 28 July, 2008 - Added info section.
Update: 7 Nov, 2006 - Reposted from old Heartless Gamer Reviews section and applied labels.
Update: 2 Apr, 2007 - Edited labels and article.
Update: 28 July, 2008 - Added info section.
"One thing that I love about our company is that there is no 'quit' in this company. It's about making sure that we have pride in what we do. People within the company feel so much pride in this game that they want it to beat the crap out of World of Warcraft. That's something we feel very passionate about. We know we are capable of making the best stuff out there, and I'm proud to say that with the changes we're making in Galaxies, I think we're headed in the right direction."
Update: 6 Apr, 2007 - Updated labels and edited post.
Update: 6 Apr, 2007 - Updated labels and edited post.
"Civil rights leader Jesse Jackson, who visited with Williams, said Schwarzenegger decided 'to choose revenge over redemption and to use Tookie Williams as a trophy in the flawed system.'My question to Jackson... isn't Arnold Schwarzenegger the epitomy of tough? Here is some proof for everyone.
'To kill him is a way of making politicians look tough,' Jackson said. 'It does not make it right. It does not make any of us safer. It does not make any of us more secure.' "
This originally was a post detailing all the parts I was ordering to build my new PC. Unfortunately most of the links are bad and it was easier to remove the post than to edit it.
This originally was a post detailing all the parts I was ordering to build my new PC. Unfortunately most of the links are bad and it was easier to remove the post than to edit it.
* Battles must now last at least ten minutes after the start of the battle in order for the losing team to receive a Mark of Honor.If anyone has tracked my writing about the battlegrounds and how the uber 24/7 hardcore gamers DOMINATE them then you will know exactly what is wrong with this knee jerk change.
This post originally linked to a Gamergod.com (now defunct) article that I wrote about World of Warcraft warriors and their effects on PvP. Unfortunately no copies of the article were saved.Update: 9 Feb, 2007 - Article has been saved from an old post on WarcraftRealms.com. I will edit it sometime in the future.
This post originally linked to a Gamergod.com (now defunct) article that I wrote about World of Warcraft warriors and their effects on PvP. Unfortunately no copies of the article were saved.Update: 9 Feb, 2007 - Article has been saved from an old post on WarcraftRealms.com. I will edit it sometime in the future.
"A naked man darted from a sport-utility vehicle into a downtown Washington office building at lunchtime yesterday and then jumped to his death from the eighth floor, officials said.
The man double-parked in the 1000 block of 15th Street NW about noon, bolted from his still-running gray Jeep Cherokee, dashed past a crowd on the street and ran into the lobby of an office building, witnesses said.
Police were still trying to identify the man yesterday and to determine why he jumped. Witnesses also were trying to sort out what happened. The man had no apparent connection to the building, according to people who work there.
"He didn't even have shoes on," said James Crouch, who was working as a temporary security guard at the building. Sitting behind the security desk, Crouch first saw the man from the waist up and thought "maybe he was a rather strange jogger. But then I stood up and saw the rest of him."
The man told Crouch that he was "handicapped," asked him for 50 cents to make a phone call and then spoke incoherently, mumbling something about his father, Crouch said.
Then the man ran to an elevator. Minutes later, he emerged from a stairwell on the eighth floor. The fire alarm had been set off, presumably by the man, and the office doors on that floor were open as people began to file out, witnesses said.
The man pushed his way into one of the offices, where he said "excuse me" several times while charging toward a window, witnesses said. He smashed the glass and jumped through the window, falling onto a parapet between two buildings. Some downtown workers saw him fall.
D.C. firefighters and emergency medical service personnel arrived at the scene, and police quickly cordoned off the block.
Workers in the eighth-floor office said they had not seen the man before and did not believe that he had ties to the offices there. They didn't hear anything he said other than "excuse me," a witness said.
Before it became apparent what was taking place, the city's parking enforcers reacted to the abandoned SUV, which had leather seats, Maryland plates and no sign of clothing inside. They slapped a ticket on the windshield."
" 'We got a lot of feedback about what was wrong and what wasn't. We saw early on that people weren't satisfied with the combat, so we decided to try something pretty radical.' "Hold on here... the MULTIPLE complaints from BETA TESTERS didn't give you a clue before you launched the game? Chalk one up for not caring about the feedback from beta testers. Another reason professional beta testers should be used to initially test an MMO. If you are paying them I would sure as hell hope you were listening to them.
"The original design of the game was very much influenced by the Richard Garriot (Ultima Online) and Brad McQuaid (early EverQuest) schools of MMOG design. That is to say that the very best experiences in the game would come from massive time investment, trial and error and endurance of hardship. The rewards that come from that are significant but highly exclusive."I was around on day one and early on they were staying as far away from the EQ model as possible and stealing only the skill idea from UO. Massive time investment, trial and error and endurance of hardship... three keys to avoiding making EQ2 (oops).
"Along those lines, it was incredibly difficult to become a Jedi. In fact, the mechanism for which it is accomplished (which was secret for a long time) is that a character has to master five specific professions (out of more than 20), and those professions were selected for that character secretly by the game at the moment of creation. The player never knew which specific five would unlock the Jedi path. It was an incredible time sink, to say the least."Bad decision to have Jedi in the game as playable in the first place. You don't decide to place the game in the "old" movie timeline and then destroy the immersion with a thousand Jedi running around. Jedi should of always been NPC only... or even better... special event characters. The new "force sensitive" class is going to be overplayed... welcome to Star Wars Jedi Online!
" 'It's mixed. It's very positive [feedback] from the people who are actually playing it. And we also have the expected push back from the people who haven't actually logged in to try it," says Smedley. "Once people get in there, it's overwhelmingly positive. It's the "the sky is falling" crowd on the forums that's still going to take some converting. I understand that. These are big changes.' "Maybe... just maybe... people are sick of you redesigning the game they've invested so much time into. Not to say these changes aren't needed, but not understanding why that vocal minority is RIGHTFULLY pissed is a sure shot to alienate even more players.
"There's a quote about the original design of Galaxies that says it was too much like living the life of Uncle Owen (the moisture farmer) and not enough like the life of Luke or Han Solo. We want to deliver more of the heroic Star Wars experience."Actually early on Star Wars Galaxies was all about being Stormtrooper #245 or a moisture farmer. Not everyone wanted to be a hero... they wanted to live among heros. Sadly most players want to "change the world" when they are playing an MMO. Unfortunately this is not possible and making classes that stand out in the movies detracts from the immersion factor. Not everyone in Star Wars is a bounty hunter or Jedi, but in Star Wars Galaxies NGE it will be quite the opposite.
test test test Original rant: LINK Episode 5 rant: LINK Episode 6 rant: LINK Episode 7 rant: LINK Episode 8: Apocalyptic Bingo! Spoilers......